Such is the report of three thousand years ago. Some years ago M. Marietta discovered the mummies of the tomb of this very king, and the broken stela bearing upon its face a full-length bas-relief of the king with the dog Bahuka between his legs, his name engraved upon his back.[1] It was often difficult to find the tomb in the necropolis. In the "Tale of Setnau" we read: "He proceeded to the necropolis of Coptos with the priests of Isis and with the high priests of Isis. They spent three days and three nights in searching all the tombs, and in examining the tablets of hieroglyphic writing, and reading the letters engraved upon them, without discovering the burial-places of Ahura and her son Merhu."[2]
Before the body was laid in the tomb it was embalmed by the "physicians of Egypt." It is by no means certain why the body was embalmed and preserved with so much care. Sir G. Wilkinson thinks that it intimated a belief in its resuscitation, but there is no proof in their writings of this belief.[3] The most probable solution is the idea that as the soul was purified in the other world so the body should be purified and prevented from putrefying in this world. So carefully are the mummies preserved that if a piece of mummy be macerated in warm water, it will recover the natural appearance of flesh, and if it be then exposed to the action of the air it will putrefy."[4]
On the way to the tomb the funeral procession halted on the shore of the sacred lake of its nome or department; and the scene of the Hall of the Two Truths was acted with an awe-inspiring solemnity. Forty-two judges stood to hear if any one on earth accused the dead as his own conscience was then accusing him in the hidden world. If an accusation was made and substantiated, the sentence of exclusion from burial was pronounced, even if the dead were the Pharaoh himself.
Such is a general outline of some few of the characteristics of the religion of the ancient Egyptians. It opens up a considerable number of questions of extreme interest touching its influence on the earlier religion of Israel from the time when Abraham "came near to enter into Egypt," during the period when "Israel abode in Egypt," first as guests then as slaves, until they were led forth by the hand of Moses, the fair child brought up in the house of Pharaoh, the man "learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians." In later ages Egypt still stood forth as the source of wisdom and learning whence flowed the culture of Greece; and still later the highest culture and most brilliant thought of the Christian Church came from the schools of Alexandria, the new capital of the old country."[5]
The Egyptian religion, unaltered by the Persians, the Ptolemies, or the Romans, was of all ancient religions the most obstinate in its resistance to Christianity. The priests of the Temple of Osiris at Philæ — "he who sleeps at Philæ" — opposed the edict of Theodosius in a.d. 379; and that so successfully that we find from the votive tablets they were in possession so late as 453 a.d. At length, however, the day came when the chants in honor of the resurrection of Osiris gave way to chants in honor of the risen Christ; and the great temple was dedicated to the martyr St. Stephen. "This good work," says a Greek inscription, "was done by the God-beloved Abbot Theodore." But the day of vengeance came, and the Christian in his turn was driven forth by the triumphant Moslem, and the Christian Church is now extinct in Nubia.
In the claim which Egypt has upon our affections let us never forget that it welcomed as guest the patriarch to whom three great religions of the world, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, trace back their spiritual origin, "our forefather Abraham;" and that it was the home in which the infant Saviour of the world, lying in his mother's arms, found a refuge, and the highest significance was given to the words: "Out of Egypt have I called my son."John Newenham Hoare.
- ↑ Trans. Bib. Arch. Soc. IV., i. 172.
- ↑ Records, iv. 547.
- ↑ Prichard, E. Myth. 198.
- ↑ Pettigrew, Hist. of Egyptian Mummies.
- ↑ Some curious details of Egyptian ritual are still extant in the various Churches of Christendom, such as the ring which the Egyptian put on his wife's finger in token that he entrusted her with his property; the feast of candles at Sais, which survives in Candlemas; the keys of St. Peter find their counterpart in the high priest of Thebes, who bore the title, "keeper of the two doors of heaven."
